Cake Balls

My friend Marci is hosting a dessert buffet tomorrow evening. Her daughter is dancing the lead part in the Nutcracker, and we are getting together with friends and relatives after the performance to celebrate. I offered to help with the food, and committed to making two different kinds of cake balls.


Marci is a whiz at entertaining. She has an eagle eye for fine details and always sets a meticulous table. When I offer to help her with a project I always try to do my very best, but not because she cares at all how I do things. In fact, it's quite the opposite. She is always very gracious about my contributions and would never be less than extremely appreciative for my efforts. However, I know if she were doing the project herself it would be done perfectly. And on time. So, when I offer to help, I aim high for semi-perfect and semi-on time.


So, I've set the stage. My friend, the glamorous hostess, is having a party, and I am to arrive with cake balls.


Cake balls seem all the rage lately. I am reading about them on many blogs. Basically, you shred a warm cake to crumbs right when it comes out of the oven. Then, you mix the crumbs with a can of frosting, and chill that mixture. Once chilled, you form it into balls and coat it in almond bark. If you're fancy, you can put them on sucker sticks.


Of course, I aimed for fancy. Fancy shmancy. It's a party, after all.


I melted the almond bark in a double boiler, and although it was extremely smooth and creamy in the pan, when I dropped the cake balls in, they became globbeldy, gloopity plunks of goo. That is the technical term from chef's school. The more I dipped, the worse it got. The only thing that made the slovenly lumps of muck worse was when I tried to stab them with sucker sticks. Really, they were awful. I announced to my husband that there was a limit to my culinary ability, and that I had grossly overstepped my boundaries. He came over to the stove to check out what all the fussing and complaining was about and confirmed that no, I wasn't just being over critical. "Unattractive", he agreed, was a grossly exaggerated understatement.

Then, he noticed something. One of the cake balls was smiling at me. Sure enough. Two green eyes, a snowflake nose, and a lopsided grin.

I need a good plan for tomorrow. I don't think my cake clumps are going to make the cut. The goal is to entertain and feed guests, not have the food laughing at them. I need a fun and fancy finger food. Any suggestions??